scribe SPRING EDITION
SAUL 8M
CONTENTS
1 3 5 7 9
A NEW BALANCE
'
2 4 6 8 10
NATURE
BEAUTY S CLIMB
THE MONSTER
CONTEMPLATIONS
WALKING IN
OF OLIVIER SEREIN
THE WOODS
UNDER SILKEN CANOPIES
A LIE
POEM
ALL IN TIME
BINGO WITH GRAMMY
SHORT STORY
CONTENTS
11
12
SURVIVAL IS
SHORT MESSAGE
INSUFFICIENT
TO READER
POEM
SHORT STORY
FELIX U6M2
FREDERICK 8J
FOREWORD "It was the best of times; it was the worst of times" Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Dear Readers, In this second edition of Scribe - and despite many of the challenges of this term - we examine some flowers of student literature, through a combination of poetry and gripping prose. We hope you find these pages replete with literary excellence: abstract ideas, tangible emotion, and artful forms - all inspired by the beauty of Spring. Joined by a blooming team of enthusiasts, we hope to inspire a fresh season of dreamers: writers that grow like the daffodils, as pen meets paper. Readers - we invite you to join this movement.
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
William Wordsworth was a true revolutionary, leading the Romantic age in English poetry. Most famous for his masterpiece, The Prelude, he was a man of radical thought and powerful feeling. Wordsworth often found himself overwhelmed by the beauty of the natural world, and in our short poem, was so struck by the sight of daffodils, that he was forced to lie down and marvel at their beauty.
Wordsworth was a real rebel in his youth and his work marked a departure from the previous classicism of Alexander Pope, who Wordsworth disliked. Shunned by his early critics, Francies Jerry stated that Wordsworth’s poem 'The Excursion' “will never do". Nonetheless, he was later made poet laureate of England - and his poetry continues to inspire and influence the nature writers and poets of today.
POEM SPOTLIGHT I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD
I wandered lonely as a Cloud That floats on high o'er Vales and Hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host of golden Daffodils; Beside the Lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the Milky Way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. The waves beside them danced, but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:— A Poet could not but be gay In such a jocund company: I gazed—and gazed—but little thought What wealth the shew to me had brought: For oft when on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude, And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the Daffodils. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH
PHOTO: FRANCESCO 7H
POETRY FEATURING ISHAN, MR HALL SHUAIB, HARMAN, SAUL, LEANDRO AND MR DUNNE
a new balance i pay homage to those who came before me, because without their sacrifices i simply could not be. i surrender my existence at their lotus feet, and i let them know that someday we will meet. they have and they will always be there for me, in the darkest of times it’s their light i can see. and they remind me that come what may, they will always guide me and reveal the way. be brave. be strong. they whisper in my ear, i feel their presence they’re ever so near. i will embody their righteousness and stick to what is true, for those are fundamental lessons that i have learnt from You. because truth forever triumphs as does being kind, this very notion thrives at the forefront of my mind. we are taught that to give is to grow, this manifestation of selflessness is what makes you glow.
i look to the future with hope yearning in my heart, a period of self-love and self-growth an opportunity to re-start. so, free from toxicity and shame i stride through this year, there’s nothing i can’t overcome there’s nothing to fear. because i am brave, imperfect, vulnerable yet tough. because i am for me – and i am enough.
6 2
ISHAN U
S
FREDERICK 8J
nature I stared in awe, the colours splashed like paint, Each petal gleamed like beautiful gems, The bluebells caressed the ornaments as they draped, Flowers blossomed proud, standing with their stems, The sun spun light that shot through the glass, It tended the flowers, beaming with such delight, The magnificent beauty added fragrance to the room, The polished table reflected all the colours, so bright, Chairs and table sat, mirroring the light, Their colours brightened majestically sparkling with vibrance, Every bit of the room stood perfect and picturesque, It enveloped everyone leaving no option but to be one with nature. SHUAIB
7
C
ART SPOTLIGHT
SHUAIB
7C
beauty's climb Like the mountains ascend into the air, So doth the beauty flourish on the youth, Childbirth, once creating tears and despair Climbs to manhood, where time beholds the truth. Time bestows its substantial gift of life By which he is overwhelmed with glory, He counts the days whilst searching for a wife Before he is left without a story. As years accelerate to their ending His gift is taken without a reason, And so the beauty’s climb starts descending As time becomes a foe and commits treason; And nothing can defend this enemy But breeding, it’s the only remedy. HARMAN
8M
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
6M2
FELIX U
the monster Hope For a new day As a majestic display of colour Rises above the horizon Behind a levelled skyline Meanwhile Yells of a greyhound From a nearby bakery But a deafening silence hung Over the moss entangled cobbled stones of the city Misty streets twisted through the town As overhanging spruce buildings Lined the city The rusty bell chimed DONG DONG DONG As the city slept A little boy Screaming for help As he sees a roaring beast With spikes of orange hair And crimson talons Swallowing Pudding Lane On Westminster Bridge The cool rushing water Flows through the city Whilst birds sang sweet songs The flaming monster Enveloping anything in its path Blind to any community Any life Anyone
The child rushes through the lifeless streets Wailing for help But no response ever came The vicious beast Crashes down shops and homes The monster’s whisper Burns Its deformed body cloaks the city And all life Succumbs Puny jets of water don’t even make a scratch On the invincible being As miniscule beings scatter across the small pathways The monster doesn’t see who you are or where you come from It sees itself And its mission SAUL
8M
LEANDRO L6S2
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
LUCAS
9M
SHAKIR 7J
Contemplations of Olivier Serein; Parisian in London; 2004 – date unknown Leaves desiccated by harsh winds easily crumble upon touch. Glass, so thin and delicate shatters completely from just one crack. Even silence is spoiled by the slightest sounds so soon after its inception. But it’s what I didn’t realise was so fragile that I shattered in an instant.
6S2
LEANDRO L
walking in the woods The playground was taped off. We kicked a ball in the long grass instead. Often, we went up to Jack's lake to feed the ducks, or wandered up the hill and through the woods, sometimes stopping to dabble toes in the stream or march under the bridge and pretend to be an ogre. But when we walk past people, we always give them a wide berth - I would jump when joggers went by without masks on. We both held back the boys: they still don't distance well. I still hold the boys back now (even though now the playground is open again), instead choosing to kick footballs through mud as I calculate the numbers of adults and children in my head - many stood shoulder to shoulder, smiling. But all the time we keep our distance. MR HALL
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
FREDDIE
8J
Under silken canopies Under silken canopies seven men Exchange a fine, fat goat for gold and grain As boys trade copper for sweet honey cakes; The women offer soft leather sandals For lamp oil, wine, olives, and salted fish – A basketful of buyers and sellers. All around are craftsman, camel and cart. “I decorated two coffins for him On the riverbank - he made a bed for me.” Among the reeds, water-fowl lay their eggs In the abandoned nests of other birds. By the shore, four figures stare blankly out Silent first and last.
MR DUNNE
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
6M2
FELIX U
PHOTO: RIYAN U6R2
FICTION FEATURING SCOTT, JAMES, ADITYA, JAMES AND KALUM
all in time
Chromium plates, aluminium loops and a great, mauve tower of temporium - that was it, the world’s first time-machine. Seventeen years of confusing algorithms and perplexing wired devices had led to this: a compact, uninviting machine that stood seven-foottall topped with a triangular mass of purple glow. But it seemed to work. Its creator gazed at his work with pride; he stretched his face into a smile and released a breath of relief. Today he would enter history. He was a short man. His eyes seemed to bulge from his head and he inflicted a decaying head of hair. Like his invention, he was distasteful to the eye. His fading looks were the result of confinement; over-working, spending months at a time evolving atoms, tiny atoms of neptunium, into a unique, useful form of a new element – temporium - the secret to time travel. And today was the day that sacrificing his appearance and existence was to finally pay off thanks to the irregularity of metals and radioactive temporium in front of him. He thought it was the most beautiful machine ever created, even putting Aphrodite to shame. As a reward for his efforts, the man took a seat in his iconic, Bauhaus-originated chair, and swiftly grabbed a newspaper from a vast untouched pile, delivered to his door daily. He groaned loudly like a wounded beast as he set his eyes on the folded inky paper, ‘MINOR CONFLICT BETWEEN NATIONS’. Those four bolden words meant nothing to a distracted being like this man at this hour, and rightly so, conflict seemed always abundant. With the date-stamped newspaper at hand, the man was ready to embark on his primary journey. He didn’t care about the risk of what he was about to do: he had no loved ones, no friends, not even any acquaintances, save for a food delivery man whom he’d never even met. If he was to get lost or his life taken, it wouldn't matter; he’d still enter the history books when someone, one day, would find his invention. Pressing the dial and pulling on the throttle, the inventor typed a few lines of computational code. He laughed to himself, knowing that by pressing one more button, the true nature of humanity's existence was about to change, that seventeen years of hard labour really came down to that one push of a button. He pressed it excitedly.
A tornado of sound thundered against his ears! He screamed. There were a million flashes of purple light as the temporium vaporised, (again, he screamed). But the next part was the worst. The seven-foot mass of machine, with its user inside, began to condense. The horrifying squeezing on all the man’s limbs was immense (and again, but for the last time, he screamed). The machine quickly shrank to a singular point. It was clear that its creator had shrunk with it. From mists of purple vapour, the singular dot then grew, and grew, and grew. In another minute, a fatigued man, with a now green complexion, stumbled out of it. He fell to the floor. Not being able to move anything but his head, he stared around him. It was clear that he was in the same place - the iconic Bauhaus-originated chair still stood in its place under a sheet of newspaper. But it was also clear that things were different; he couldn't think why, he just knew. Gradually recovering movement and glaring at his time piece on the machine, the joyous man believed that he had travelled a few decades into the future, but even though he believed the time was different, the man knew something else was too. As the dishevelled being, who believed he had conquered time, ambled to the respite of his chair, he noticed the news article. The article, old as he thought it was, looked even older than its years. Purple dust covered it. But still it headlined those four large words. The small man now grew tense; he wanted to know what the strange thing that had changed was. He limped outside. Opening the door to his house, (which was ultimately just a laboratory with a bed in it), the curious man poised his eyes at the outside world.
His heart pounding, the stunned man came to think how he was an observer to a near future world where a dark sky crested a blank earth. There still stood houses, but their colour had bleached away; some of their bricks had turned to dust. The houses were deafly silent, as the man quickly figured out that no people were living in them. The man, a man who had ignored humanity his entire life, now assumed that in just a few decades people were gone, people were extinct. Even though he had never gotten on well with people, the world without them seemed strange, seemed despicable. He was alone. Switching his gaze to the floor, the man noticed his folded newspaper now declaring, ‘NUCLEAR WAR ENSUES, WORLD SEEING ITS LAST DAYS!’ This wasn’t what he had wanted, not at all. The shocked man would make it his mission to warn his time of its dismal future - compassion became a growing seedling within him. Clambering back into the machine, the anxious man dreaded the horror of time travel again, but he had to save humanity. The same pains and terrors of travelling occurred, and numerous times the horrified man screamed. Again he fumbled out of his machine. Again he limped outside his door, but this time to warn everyone of a dismal future. When he opened his door, the man screamed. There sat the same newspaper, there stood the same rotting houses and there hovered the same deep black sky. The man dropped to his knees. He realised he had failed to travel time. His machine was useless. Worse, he had failed to truly live his life. He unfolded the newspaper, ‘MINOR CONFLICT BETWEEN NATIONS ERUPTS AS NUCLEAR WAR ENSUES, WORLD SEEING ITS LAST DAYS!’ SCOTT 11M
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
AISHIEK
9J2
a lie
I grabbed the unopened letter and ran from my house, my mother’s demands to stop chasing me all the way up the street. I ignored them, knowing that they would be louder if she read the letter I was holding. Irrationally I believed that if I could destroy the letter, the words on it would also disappear forever. With trembling hands I flicked open my lighter and brought it to the paper, watching the flames eat the words before the words could consume me. I knew I couldn’t face my mother’s wrath now. It was better if she had one more day of peace, without having to worry about my future, a future that I had destroyed. I was lucky enough to live walking-distance away from a good school, which was where I headed now, despite knowing I would be the first one there by at least thirty minutes. I walked next to my favourite river, trying to forget the tumultuous morning I had just experienced. Normally when I gazed into the river I saw my reflection and the fish swimming, the gently flowing current the only thing they had to worry about. Now I saw a broken, dishevelled man staring back, his eyes sunken and downcast, his dirty, stained beanie the only splash of colour. With stark clarity I knew it was not my reflection but a projection of my life when I was older that was staring back at me. Surely not? Surely there was still some hope for me, or had my dice already been cast by the fiendish followers of fate? I arrived at school at the same time as everyone else, my shortlived vision and resulting panic having mercilessly consumed my time. It felt like everything was slowly destroying me, even the river I had once loved. I snapped out of my stupor to see my best friend Jim walking up to me, his pale blue eyes slightly squinting, eyebrows furrowed. “What did you get in your GCSEs?” he muttered. This should have been a warning for me. I should have realised that Jim, like me, had done badly. Very badly. But I didn’t, and I made a decision that would follow me like a shadow. “Straight nines,” I replied, trying to look as smug as I could. I could tell I wasn’t pulling it off. I don’t get much practise. I regretted the words instantly. I could see them floating in the air, forming an unbridgeable gap. I knew that anything I said now would only widen the abyss between us.
“Oh,” he replied. Jim looked as if I had just sentenced him to death. “I got a letter this morning,” he continued shakily, “asking me to leave the school. I shouldn’t be surprised really – I didn’t get anything above a six.” I had stopped listening by this point. The guilt I felt earlier intensified tenfold. If only I had been strong enough to be honest and admit my failures. Knowing I wasn’t alone in my failures, calmed me somewhat. Jim could continue being my rock – he could get me through this mistake in my life and ensure that I never became the man in the river. By the time these thoughts had trundled though my head Jim had disappeared. I stood alone before the intimidating, metal gates, letting my peers walk past me, their laughter and happiness at their results intensifying my anger and guilt. The rest of the day blended together, my mind filled with my careless lie that could have ruined my only friendship forever. I run out of my last class – Ethics – in search of Jim, hoping to catch him before he leaves the school. I step out onto the road to see his distinctive Red Hot Chilli Peppers backpack disappearing into a dark green car, his mother at the wheel. Disappointed and defeated, I walk home, trying my best to stretch it out, avoiding my mother’s rage for as long as I can. I pass the river and avert my eyes, too scared of what I might see this time. I can’t stop myself from hearing the river between passing cars, its once innocent giggles now sounding like a wraith’s whispers, taunting me. I arrive home and sprint up the stairs, ignoring my mother’s screams for the second time that day. A small part of me registers a thrill at no longer conforming to her every demand, but it was quickly swept away by the tide of guilt that threatens to drown me every second. I take a deep breath and pull out my phone. I was going to confess. I press Jim’s contact and call his phone trying to settle my nerves. It was just a call between friends. Were we still friends? Before I could answer this new worrying predicament that my over-active imagination had thrown my way, Jim answered. “Can we ta-,” I started, but the sound of him crying stops me. “I thought we were alike before,” he started, “that we had similar ambitions, similar capabilities. But your results have proved me wrong. Congratulations, by the way.”
He didn’t sound congratulatory. “I was going to go to St. Edmunds, now that I’ve been kicked out of this place,” he continued bitterly. “I’ve retracted my offer now. An academic path is clearly not the one I should be walking.” He hung up, leaving me shell-shocked on my bed. I couldn’t believe that my lie, two words, a spur of the moment decision, could have this big of an effect. My mum barged in, discarding her usual customary knocking. “The school emailed me,” she started, hesitating after seeing the look on my face. Remembering her anger and my disobedience, she continued steadfastly. “They recommended a school for you to go – St. Edmunds.” Her final two words entered my head then slowly morphed into a different sound, the sound of a hammer hammering the nails into my coffin. I had made my death bed, and now I had to lie in it. The next week I entered St. Edmunds with my shoulders hunched, already wishing for the day to be over. The rain hammered my back, trying to force me into submission. I straightened, haunted by the man in the river and determined to prove him wrong. My new peers flowed around me, their happiness making them ignore the lashing rain. I knew no one. My first class was Maths and within minutes I had already lost my concentration. There was only one seat left when I had entered – the back-left corner, by the window. I was in a new class by myself, having lost my only real friend and ruined both our lives. I sat there and stared out the window into the growing dark, watching the ominous clouds creep up towards the school, like darkness was slowly creeping into my life. JAMES 11J
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
6M2
FELIX U
bingo with grammy “Man Alive number 5,” read Robert. There was this sluggish scent of death that seemed to hang over Elstree bingo hall ; this scent would quite naturally mix with the stifling aura of over sprayed perfume the ensemble of chattering old ladies wore. At the front, the orchestra of ladies seemed to picked up quite the crescendo , narrating to each other whose son had just become a partner at a big law firm and whose son had just had their third baby. In direct contrast , the old men who appeared to be detached from their gossiping wives , could be seen , nay, heard quite audibly masticating away at the free selection of cheese and onion sandwiches and prawn cocktail crisps like snares accompanying the orchestra. “Number 10 Gordon's den,” deemed Rob. I never liked games: neither Bingo nor Jenga, Guess Who or Monopoly. I always thought of “Games”, in primary school, to be tailor made for those who struggled, as if pulling the last brick of a Jenga tower were a compensation for a general lack of abiliy to use commas and apostrophes. So on Friday afternoon, after school, when I found out I had to play bingo with Gammy I wasn’t enormously enthralled. Friday, of course, was the day before the weekend - the palpable scent of students , teachers, janitors, colluded with the lie that the weekend was going to be good, better, best - here it was most potent. Yet here, when I could be slopping away at my Dominoes pizza whilst taking a bubble bath, I’d be sat in a sticky old age home. “Thee and me 33 Ro,” Bert's raspy Yorkshire accent boomed through the speakers, colliding with the forgotten walls of the hall. I twiddle my thumbs: my eyes slicing through grey hair bobbles across the hall like cumulonimbus clouds; from pensioner to pensioner: Karen sits in her armchair while grunting Gareth stares intently at his bingo card, John attempts with saffron fingernails to salvage the bottom fruit pastel from the packet causing tin foil to fall like recyclable rose petals onto a bewildered cheese and onion sandwich below. And Gammy... Gammy sitting to my right, lost in thought, a smile flows as a delicate yet weak canal running through the wrinkles of her face : a smile her face seemed to have forgotten until it met my eyes.
“71 J- Lo’s bum,” proclaimed Robert lustfully. Gareth like a wolf grumbled back in anticipation, whistling through gaps in his teeth that his dentures could not cover. Gammy does not, as she stares with hollow hazel eyes, loosely holding her special aquamarine bingo dotter that I got her for Christmas a few years back (which still hasn't run dry, an unprecedented run of rotten bingo luck?) Or maybe like Robert's numbers her memory is slowly dwindling away? I point out in an enthusiastic whisper ,though fuelled with this guilt ridden charade of happy to be here visits, the 71 on her untouched bingo card. I see her eyes flicker from the window to my lips , noticing their movement through her bug eyeglasses. A grin recapitulating. “Tommy did I ever tell you how your grandfather and I used to visit the bingo hall every Friday night?” She narrates this while she stamps gently the single box. “You remind me a lot of him you know… You have his eyes you know…”she remarked, her voice trailing off. I stared at her, lost for words, not in sympathy nor pity but guilt. My eyes seem to stall, searching for words, in a vain attempt, capturing Gammy’s moss green jumper, hand knitted in the 50s and tucked into her off white skirt, which concealed a solitary napkin in the event of a spillage. Her watch remained uncorrected, since the clocks went forward four months ago, as she wears grandad’s old tartan slippers. “How did the hall look? Did you win anything? What was he wearing? What were you wearing?” I probed attempting to make conversation. “ I don’t remember,” she muttered. “I’m losing my memory ,Tommy ..after a while I may not remember who your grandfather was,” she paused. “Tommy, you will tell me this story again won't you?”
I nodded my head in silence, stifled by the arising emotion I was beginning to feel. “Love, why don’t you get me an ice cream from the cart over there?” I oblige, using this moment as an alibi to hide my shame. “Heavens gate 78,” declared Robert. I sat down yielding two tubs of Ben and Jerry's blueberry. “Tommy,” said Gammy, “did I ever tell you about the first time I met your grandfather…It was right here in this very bingo hall.” I shook my head in silence, again. “Grandma's gone to heaven 87“ read Robert. “Bingo!” howled Gareth , a werewolf on a full moon night.
ADITYA 11C
Survival is Insufficient Kirsten rummaged through the stranger’s cupboard looking for an old magazine. The stranger was dead in the toilet and a rancid smell crept underneath the doorway, like a draft of death. Kirsten’s nosed was scrunched up, but inside this untouched house, she was in heaven: she placed cans in her bags, searched for a new knife and tent and most importantly, an Arthur Leander snipping in the faded magazines. From before the end of civilisation, from before the deadly pandemic, Kirsten remembered a fleeting image of Arthur Leander’s death on stage as King Lear. The famous actor had had a heart attack on stage in front of her – she had been playing a child version of one of his daughters - and she could still picture his flailing arm reaching for the fake marble column. Most vividly, she remembered receiving a beautiful comic book from him moments before his final show. That comic lay ziplocked in a protective bag in her backpack, the vivid pages of the floating world Station Eleven engrained in her mind. Flicking through the final magazine, Kirsten spotted a small, faded image of Arthur, his first wife Miranda and his son. She tore away the surrounding words and placed the image, alongside her growing collection of cuttings and pictures of Arthur, in her protective zip-lock bag. One final check. Kirsten riffled through the cupboards looking for any canned foods, being careful not to touch the horribly decomposed fruits and spilt foods. The lingering thick smell of death and rot filled the room, but there was no survivor unaccustomed to the miasma. “I’ve found a tent!” Dieter called from up the old wooden stairs, his head in a large cupboard. Kirsten was relieved, over a year ago now her tent had ripped and since then she had slept with April by the roadside with the rest of the Travelling Symphony.
The pair made their way out of the house, newly filled suitcases bouncing along the cobbles behind them. To Dieter this brought back memories of family holidays and aeroplane journeys and he looked towards the sky hopefully, as he had done so many times before, for the sight of a plane and the accompanying freedom. There was none. They walked towards their waiting companions, who were on the main road. The Travelling Symphony, a large bickering family, were spread out around the horse-pulled caravans, whose sides had been roughly painted with the words ‘Survival is Insufficient’. Almost 20 years ago, on the very day of Arthur’s death, the world had been all but annihilated by the Georgian Flu, which killed over 99.9% of people. The world plunged into horrific panic and despair; the world was never the same. The survivors had now settled into fragmented groups spread far and wide across the country. They lived out of hotels, service stations and little towns. Some settlements seemed to be perfectly logical, and well governed communities, and some were quite obviously in the grips of something horrible, sometimes with pregnant children staring from the window or starved people dressed all in white or a dictator or supposed prophet living lavishly. Even from a distance, Kirsten could make out the small balding head of the conductor tending to the horses and the musicians huddled around a small fire. The Travelling Symphony saw it as their job to bring hope and beauty into the violent and despairing new world. They moved from town to town performing Shakespeare and music, and it was in those moments of transcendent beauty, when the crowd’s faces lit up, that Kirsten was truly alive. JAMES 10C
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
SAUL
8
M
short message to reader I am going to tell you something that you never knew before. Hopefully, your feeble mind will be able to comprehend it. About a month, before this book of deceit was published, I broke into the wretched office of the Bloomsbury Publishing company. The miserable, ineffectual men and women who had been tapping away at their desks, working at their menial tasks, had been completely ignorant to my entry. Eventually, I managed to seize one of the computers and type this very message that you are reading now. Hermex – it was my life’s work. Indeed, I loved it; it was my opium. My Hermex, was brilliant, it was revolutionary; but he had always denied to acknowledge its brilliance. Years ago, he fired me; he said I was “out of touch”. Of course, he knew the actual reason as to why he had fired me, and so did I. Understanding will come to you eventually he said; and then he took Hermex. Lexicals he renamed it; it was the solution to the 21st century’s biggest problem, it had been my life’s work, the most revolutionary invention since the development of the internet and he gave it his namesake. Obviously, my creation was a complete success; but he made the cardinal mistake of crediting himself for its creation. Vexed, incensed, infuriated; I will never forget how I felt when I turned on the television and saw his unctuous face glaring back at me whilst receiving his Nobel Peace Prize. Eager I was then and eager I am still now to get my revenge. How will I get my revenge? I will tell you precisely how. My message at the front of his silly, deceitful biography will bring him down and shame him for all eternity. Simply, however, that would not be enough. On the day of his grand book signing at the British museum I have prepared a delightful treat for my old friend.
I have no need to be clandestine of my plans at the book signing and thus I shall set out my plans to you very clear; I am going to kill him. With a knife? I have decided that will not work; albeit I want to provide my old friend with a little bit more of a spectacle. Larius 345, is my serum of choice, and I have full faith that it shall provide quite the extravaganza. Lazy people work in museums, lethargy is in their DNA, it's in their blood and despite the immense complexity of the challenge that lies ahead, I know it shall be a success. Killing him will not be easy; and thus, I have been blessed with the help of some of his ex- employees who, like me, hate him. I will enter the museum; and I shall sneak past the lethargic guards and enter my venomous serum into the water tank – this water will eventually be given to him. Lucy, one of my ex-colleagues will be responsible for stalling the guards and providing a distraction; albeit they will most probably be distracted anyway. Lucas had managed to get a role as volunteer for the day, at the book signing; he will be responsible for ensuring that our old friend gets the cup of water which will lead him to his fate. You might ask – Why would you reveal your plan? Or you may be thinking – Why don’t you just take him to court and prove that it was your invention? Understandingly, your feeble mind cannot comprehend my ingenuity. However, might I recommend; if you desire an answer to these questions – start at the beginning of this message that you are reading now and take a look at the first letter of each word. If you chose to do so, I do hope to be seeing you very soon. KALUM 9C
PHOTOGRAPHY SPOTLIGHT
FARAZ
10
R
MEET THE TEAM EDITOR-IN-CHIEF SPOTLIGHT EDITOR POETRY EDITOR FICTION EDITOR HEAD OF MARKETING SUPERVISOR
OZAIR SURTI OLIVER CHENG JOHN HILLAN ADITYA PILLAI YUVI BAJAJ MR LUNN
FELIX U6M2